The field of computer graphics has played an important role in the adv
ancement of structural molecular biology and in the development of str
ucture-based drug design. This article will provide a brief background
on the development of this technology, and then focus on the current
trends and future directions in molecular graphics and how they will i
mpact the practice of molecular modeling and design. Specific areas th
at will be covered include: 1) the development of surface and volume b
ased representations of molecular properties and interactions; 2) new
approaches to modeling flexible and multi-component structures, and 3)
the impact of object-oriented graphics-based programming and the rapi
dly growing use of network based computing.